Diablo III beta open to all this weekend

Come one, come all.

Anyone with a valid Battle.net account will be able to play the game between 7:01am NZST Saturday until 5:01am Tuesday, says Blizzard. Players interested in participating can start downloading the Diablo III client immediately.

"Everyone is invited to log in and help us put the game and servers through their paces in this three day stress test as we march toward the game's release on May 15," writes Blizzard in a blog post. "You'll be able to log in, team up with friends, and play each of the five heroic classes to level 13 as you fight to save the world from the impending demonic invasion."

Blizzard is describing the weekend as a stress test, so it's possible some performance and connection issues might crop up as the servers get swamped with players. "It's very possible that players connecting to the stress test could experience issues with the service. While not ideal, this is exactly why we're having a stress test," explains Blizzard. "We want to catch and analyse as many bugs as possible during this stress test period, so that we can try to ensure a smooth launch on May 15."